Russia launches Baltic drills alongside NATO Saber Strike war games

The Baltic Sea and skies are getting crowded as Russia launches military training of its assault forces in the exclave of Kaliningrad in answer to the double war-games being conducted by joint NATO forces on the territory of the three Baltic States.

NATO’s decision to conduct dual war games next to Russian borders
in the Baltic has not been left unaddressed by Russia’s Defense
Ministry, which prepared a surprise training of first strike
forces – marines, paratroopers and long-range bombers - right in
the backyard of the NATO military maneuvers.

“We conduct military training simultaneously with the
international war games that have started in Europe, Saber
Strike-2014 and BALTOPS-2014,” said the ministry’s press
service.

Defense Ministry noted that the military might engaged in
training in the Kaliningrad Region is by all means comparable
with the NATO’s forces concentrated on the nearby territory of
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, where Saber Strike-2014 is
conducted on June 9-20 and sea-based BALTOPS-2014 training held
in the Baltic on June 6-21.

The Russian maneuvers involve the use of naval groups, marines,
landing operations of airborne forces, air defense training and
firing exercise of front-line aviation.

The paratrooper division from Pskov will be training operational
deployment to Kaliningrad, whereas marines will be training
defending the coastal line from possible sea-borne landing and
will also perform isolation and elimination of illegal armed
groups.

The Air Force is to provide fire support with Su-34
fighter-bombers and Mi-24 assault helicopters.

Deployment of supersonic Tu-22M3 long-range strategic maritime
strike bombers, some of which have just the day before finished
training in the Black Sea, has also been announced. Together with
the air defense forces they will patrol the area to make sure the
airspace of the training is securely sealed off.

NATO’s training in the Baltic is an annual event yet this time
the number of troops taking part has been augmented considerably.
In 2013 there were 1,800 troops involved, while Saber Strike 2014
has become the largest-ever, with 4,700 troops and over 800
military vehicles, such as M2 Bradley, M1126 Stryker, and various
APCs: XA-180, XA-202 and M113 taking part in the training.

Besides the two NATO war-games, the Baltic States are holding
Baltic Host 2014 military cooperation training of their own near
Riga.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has already dubbed even
the rotational military build-up near the Russian borders as an
act of hostility directly violating the NATO-Russia Founding Act
of 1997, Lavrov’s First Deputy Vladimir Titov told Interfax.

With the background of developments in Ukraine, the beef-up of
NATO’s military presence near Russian borders, “just like during
the 08.08.08 war in the North Caucasus, it rather creates
additional problems instead of helping to solve them, Titov said.

On Monday Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said after meeting his Finnish counterpart Erkki
Tuomioja that, “The artificial attempt to continue NATO's
eastward expansion, progression of the military infrastructure to
the east, closer to Russia's borders, is counterproductive.”